Douglas A Schrock

Meet Me by the Lane Douglas A Schrock

We now learn more about the rise of Carl Ring, the future Antichrist-about his viewpoints, about his inspirations, about his intentions, about how his fallen English wife from two centuries ago still haunts his every thought and word and action. As the 2050s roll on unbearably for him, he becomes more and more enraged by what he sees around him in Europe and elsewhere in the world: the liberalism, the socialism, the outright Communism, what he considers the halfhearted right-wing efforts at reform, the never-ending flood of Islamic immigrants he views as invaders. Above all else, by Russia and the East. And then there is a third war in Korea. Poorly planned and prepared for and executed yet again, just like Second Korea, it results in more American than Korean dead, enraging an increasingly evil and bloodthirsty nation who will not stand for continuing defeats or even stalemates on the battlefield any longer, especially the new precedent of more American than enemy casualties. There is, however, one caveat to America's poor performance: she decides to use poison gas against her foe. In Europe, Ring notices, and begins to plan his move. He actually believes that a worse form of gas will be vital. Maddened by the myths of his Teutonic ancestors, and his fantasy of a new Crusade led by Anglo-Saxon and American men of war like him, he is war and death in human form. World War III begins. Ring's choice of venue for his Crusade to be launched is Munich in the fall of 2060 immediately following the election of his rival Ryan Preston, veteran of Second Korea and hardline anti-Chinese Senator from Missouri, not to mention author of the treatise "Absolute Freedom" in which Preston celebrates the possibility of a limitless environment where men and women can do, both alone and together, whatever they wish with no consequences, no moral restraints, no true guilt or wrongdoing. Preston, the False Prophet of Revelation, is aided and abetted by his new wife Joanna Preston, daughter of the late President Greg Cobalt; she has the perfect blend of grace-abusing false theology and radical Republican politics. As the nightmarish new President and First Lady, they compound Ring's murderous quest for glory in Germany and Austria and the Netherlands and the Balkans by launching a disastrous assault upon East Asia, primarily Communist China. Preston, even more than his predecessors in Korea, does not plan properly, and of course the situation worsens overnight, despite massive bombing and an infantry assault utilizing half his nation's active forces. Soon his "Operation Desperate Freedom" and the infantry invasion that follows it will result in stalemate, leading many to think the worst of things has passed...but of course this is a lie, both because of Beijing's ensuing rage and chaos and the fact that Ring has no intention whatsoever of turning back from Turkey. Ring imagines himself the world's final Crusader, Edward I Longshanks brought back to life, a mythic hero whose job it is to make things right. War and "justice" are his obsessions. New and tragic, yet very often villainous, characters are introduced: a mystery woman from Russia who begins to mislead the Prestons down a dark and dreadful path both personally and politically; an up-and-coming Chinese general who converts to a wrongful brand of Christian faith and imagines himself a modern Genghis Khan-he will not forget or forgive so easily what the armada sent by Preston has done to the coast of China he adores; and a beautiful exception-a courageous Jewish astronaut named Tempus, the protagonist of "Closed Universe," once vain and violent and vindictive but now changed, a man whose heart is shattered by the atrocities of Ring against Tempus' fellow Jews and others back on Earth nearly five billion miles away... Soon enough, he will miraculously return to Earth, where he and the Scotsman Darcloch will address the world together and implore them to change while time remains.